Apex Legends Season 8: Everything we know

What can we expect from Apex Legends Season 8? With a new character and weapon on the way, the next season of the Apex Games has been set up for a fiery start. Fuse has already made a dramatic entrance, and Kings Canyon has been blown to smithereens.

It's no surprise that this season has been tagged 'Mayhem', and I imagine Respawn still has a few more surprises lined up for us. While official details on Fuse's abilities are yet to be announced, we do have a few clues as to what his powers may be, thanks to some dataminers. Here's everything we know about Apex Legends Season 8, including the new Salvo legend, battle pass, and upcoming balance changes.

What is the Apex Legends Season 8 release date?

The Apex Legends Season 8 release date is February 2. This gives you some time to wrap up outstanding challenges and unlock the final tiers on your battle pass. Mayhem will introduce a fresh pass featuring Apex Packs, skins, and more. So, as soon as the new season drops, prepare to start the grind all over again to unlock some goodies.

How much does the Apex Legends Season 8 battle pass cost?

After seven seasons, we have a pretty good idea of what to expect from the Mayhem battle pass. The regular Season 8 battle pass should cost 950 Apex Coins ($9.99/£7.99). This usually includes a small selection of weapon and Legend skins to help you kickstart the season in style.

If you're eager to get your hands on the goods as soon as possible, you can pick up the battle pass bundle instead. At 2,800 Apex Coins, this unlocks the first 25 tiers of the pass, dropping an array of charms, holo-sprays, and skins straight into your inventory. The cheapest way to pick up the battle pass bundle is by purchasing 1,000 Apex Coins and 2,000 Apex Coins separately for a combined total of $29.98/£23.98.

Watch the Apex Legends Season 8 trailer

The Season 8 launch trailer dropped with a bang, giving us a look at Fuse's earth-shattering arrival in Kings Canyon. Unfortunately his big entrance is interrupted by his pal Maggie, who does just about everything she can to turn the map into swiss cheese, using the cannons from Fuse's ship. Thankfully it looks like the legends made it out of the wreckage relatively unscathed, and we can be sure that the Salvo newcomer is ready to get to work.

Apex Legends new legend: Who is Walter “Fuse” Fitzroy?

Apex Legends' new hero is Fuse, an Aussie hothead with a killer moustache. As we learn in his Apex Legends' Stories from the Outlands "Good as Gold" episode, Walter 'Fuse' Fitzroy grew up in Salvo—a planet that we know has unified with the Syndicate Space in the Apex universe.

The video briefly shows a glimpse of Fuse and his close friend Mags (the same person that crops up in the launch trailer) as children, where they stumble across a golden grenade on the corpse of a Salvo freedom fighter. We later see things turn sour between the pair when Mags drops the grenade, resulting in Fuse losing one of his arms. As we can see in the launch trailer, he now has a mechanical one in its place.

I had some fun with this the other day! Fuse's teaser will be going live 1/16/2021Don't ask questions, just enjoy me shooting some fish in a barrel.#ApexLegends pic.twitter.com/TM5PlEyD1vJanuary 14, 2021

Apex Legends Fuse abilities

Ahead of his character trailer, Fuse's abilities have been datamined by both SomeoneWhoLeaks and Shrugtal. Shrugtal is a reliable Apex Legends dataminer who has consistently shared accurate information in the past. Whereas SomeoneWhoLeaks has even gone as far as posting clips of Fuse's datamined abilities on Twitter. Based off these leaks, here's what Fuse's abilities may look like: 

Tactical

• Airburst Grenade: Launches an explosive grenade from Fuse's arm. 

Passive

• Assault: Hold more grenades.

Ultimate

• The Motherlode: Launches a mortar. When fired at, this explodes and leaves a ring of flames on the floor.

Fuse tactical launch / toss#ApexLegends pic.twitter.com/RX3LfjTPmBJanuary 5, 2021

Fuse's tactical ability sounds very promising. We already have three different types of grenades in Apex, but they each take up precious inventory slots. So, if your strategy relies heavily on explosives, you usually need to find a big backpack first. If we're able to launch these directly from Fuse's arm with a short cooldown, this may well be one of the best tacticals in the game. His proposed passive also seems valuable for the same reasons.

I can already think of a couple of legends who could benefit from Fuse's ultimate. Horizon springs to mind first, as her Black Hole ability pulls and holds players inwards, before setting off a graviton blast. Tossing the Motherlode missile into the black hole would be enough to finish off an enemy squad quickly. Combining Fuse's ultimate with Caustic's Nox Gas Grenade also sounds like an easy way to deal substantial damage quickly.

Will there be an Anniversary Collection Event? 

According to clues found in Apex Legend's code, we could see a collection event launching alongside Season 8 on February 2. Usually, these collection events occur after the season has started, but Respawn may be shaking things up for 2021.

As explained in Shrugtal's video, the reward for owning all the items in the collection event may be Heirloom Shards this time around. This suggests that we'll be able to pick an existing Heirloom, rather than Respawn introducing a new one. This doesn't necessarily mean that we won't receive a new Heirloom this season, it may appear later on in a separate event.

The colour palette for the leaked Anniversary Collection event skins appears to stick to a red and black theme. Shrugtal has previously shown off some Lifeline and Bangalore skins, and there's a Spitfire skin that gives us a good idea of what to expect from other legendary cosmetics arriving in Mayhem.

Bombs are landing in Kings Canyon. Possible teaser related to Salvo from r/ApexLore

What's happening to Kings Canyon?

We've seen Kings Canyon's landscape change over the course of its life, from the removal of Skulltown, to the mysterious addition of Apex Legends bunkers. Respawn has sent a very strong message along with their Season 8 teases, and that's that Kings Canyon will be "obliterated".

Explosives have already been spotted, dropping during the final rounds in matches on Kings Canyon recently. Similar to Fuse's rumoured ultimate, these explode into a ring of flames when fired at.

This will be the third major rework to Apex's original map, and as we can see in the launch trailer, large portions of the Kings Canyon will have been affected by the huge blast Maggie set off. The ship that Fuse entered the Apex Games on also looks as though it'll be a permanent feature from now on. It's fair to assume that parts of the map will continue to sport a scorched look, and I imagine these areas will be filled with rubble and still smoking by the time Mayhem launches.

Will there be a new Apex Legends Season 8 weapon?

Seeing as Fuse hails from Salvo, it's fitting that we'll be kicking off Season 8 with a new weapon from his home planet. Mayhem introduces the 30-30 Repeater, a lever-action rifle that prioritises precision over fire rate. Its description mentions 'hard-hitting rounds', which suggests that it uses Heavy Ammo, similar to the existing Wingman and Hemlok weapons.

We can expect the 30-30 Repeater to fire single shots, so you'll need an eagle eye and steady aim if you're keen to make this your new main weapon. It's always a good idea to make time for a spot of aim training ahead of a new weapon release to ensure your reflexes and tracking are on point.

Wraith and Horizon nerfs are on the way

Shortly after a post outlining Horizon's impressive win rate appeared on Reddit, Respawn's live balance designer John Larson hopped in to confirm that both Wraith and Horizon are on the cutting board for balance adjustments in Season 8. Here's what Larson had to say about the impending Horizon tweaks:

"I’m adamant about not gutting her kit; the synergy between her passive and tactical is awesome. Looking at her tactical alone there are all sorts of dials we can turn including vertical lift speed, horizontal speed/acceleration, ejection speed/time, cool down, weapon accuracy, and the list goes on."

Wraith was also mentioned as an "outlier" who, alongside Horizon, is "head and shoulders above everyone else" on the Apex roster. Previously (via Dexerto) lead game designer Daniel Klein highlighted that Respawn will be focusing on Wraith's hitboxes, which gives her a significant advantage at present. Klein commented that "with Wraith, our approach is going to be very similar to Pathfinder. We’re going to take a look at her hitboxes and see how much wiggle room we have there."